


The Bowman and The Prince

by itstonedme



Series: Bardolas series [1]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: FPS, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 21:12:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/918079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itstonedme/pseuds/itstonedme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Legolas journeys to Laketown on the night that Smaug attacks.  Inspired by <i>The Hobbit</i> by J.R.R. Tolkien.  The following story departs from canon.  It is told here only as a teaser to the coming release of <i>The Desolation of Smaug.</i>  </p>
<p>Special thanks to Stormatdusk for the quick beta and kind words.  Originally posted on Live Journal <a>here</a>, August 2013.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bowman and The Prince

Had it not been for barter, Legolas, Prince of Mirkwood within the Woodland Realm, would not have been on the road to Esgaroth when Smaug let loose his wrath upon the people of the Long Lake. 

It was from their camp several leagues distant that the elves of Mirkwood bore witness as the sky boiled into flame above the wooden town, smoke churning into the moonlit night. The air screamed from wind sucked into the inferno, but there was no matching cry from the people that the dragon had set upon. More than anything else, it was this silence that filled the elves with an eerie dread. 

"Quickly," Legolas called out, but there was no need for his command. Already, the goods they had brought were being pulled off the path, grasses and saplings hastily slashed to hide them for the time when they might return, for there would be no trade, not now. 

The elves of the forest spread like a fan through the brush and rushes, racing towards Laketown, silence and fury on course to meet silence and fire.

*

They slipped into the lake a quarter league upwind of the town, bows and quivers held high above the water, their green tunics and flaxen hair at one with the marsh reeds and bleached grasses as firelight reflected upon them. The dragon's furnace had turned the water into a blistering heat; steam rose where it eddied in small bays along the shoreline, and the unfortunate among the townspeople who had escaped to these inlets survived with no greater success than their brethren trapped in the town. Further out in the inky waters, townsfolk cried out and struggled to swim, but for many, the weight of their garments and children took them beneath the waves where they expired, returning to the surface – young and old alike – as the drifting dead. The elves pulled those who yet lived to safety, leaving them upon the shore to survive or perish.

It was within the winding firestorm of Laketown's besieged streets that Legolas came upon a man named Bard leading a complement of brave citizens armed with bows and arrows. "We need your kingdom's help!" Bard yelled upon seeing Legolas.

"Already a messenger flies to my father," the Prince replied, and Bard nodded in recognition. Together, they stood aligned, aiming their arrows each time Smaug passed over the town. 

"You are a mighty bowman," Legolas called out as arrow upon arrow flew from Bard's great yew bow. For even though each steel-tipped dart was deflected away by the armor of the dragon's scales, each set a course true and intended. 

"As are you, son of Thranduil, as are you," the bowman yelled back, sweat flying from his brow. He yelled once more to his number, urging them to fight on in the names of all they held dear.

The dragon was a fearsome foe, and before Bard slew him that night with his last arrow, one black as ebony and heavy with the knowledge of a hobbit, Smaug's fire rained upon the vale of Laketown and its inhabitants, turning man, woman, child and beast into ash and memory. Tears were insufficient to measure the town's losses, the wails of grief too few among the surviving voices. It was a horror to all who knew that night, and it would live forever through the generations.

When at last Smaug's mighty scaled body lay charring among the pyre he had created, the people of Laketown came together to count their dead and to send messengers to Thorin at Erebor that their enemy – the one that he and his company had awakened and unleashed – had been slain. 

*

The desolation of Laketown was a particular anguish to Legolas, for its inhabitants were among the few the elves of Mirkwood considered friends. He watched in silent counsel as Bard withdrew from the glory that survivors sought to impose upon him for the salvation he had brought with the dragon's slaying. He said nothing as the cowardly and greedy Master of Laketown insinuated himself back into the town's leadership. The true savior of the town scrabbled the earth beside Legolas daily and long into each night, providing for others until weariness broke his strength. Where the bowman left off, Legolas continued until the dawn, and each morning, Bard rose to a quiet smile and a recounting of the night's reparations. 

In the days that followed, parlays were requested of Thorin for restitution to Esgaroth from the immense wealth he held within the mountain. But Laketown and its people were denied. Moreover, with the arrival of Thranduil and his army of elves to lend support to its people in the rebuilding of Esgaroth and in their claim, Thorin's ire was kindled anew, so great was his hatred of elves. Despite his eloquence and conviction, Bard's petition to the King under the Mountain went for naught. Thorin remained fixed in his bitterness, and hunkered within his stronghold to await the arrival of his kind. 

But the days spent in the company of the elven host, especially Thranduil and his son the Prince, settled Bard's spirit and gave him strength. He and Legolas toiled side by side, removing the charred skeleton of the town, digging graves for the dead and food for the living. Bard marvelled that no matter the heavy, filthy work at hand, the elf yet remained unsoiled by soot or sweat, and cheerful and elegant in his labors. 

"You bring spirit and grace to our devastation," Bard told Thranduil on a night when the moon waned low. 

"Alas, this was a battle that my kingdom should have fought long ago," Thranduil said sadly. "Might your people have lived out their lives in peace had I acted thus."

"It is done," Bard replied. He bore no malice to history. "The dragon is vanquished. We now live for the dawn; it cannot be otherwise."

*

The race of men fascinated the Prince. What he saw in Bard – the decency, the patience, the bravery and fairness -- he had seen in others, mostly the rangers whose travels had crossed his own. And being of a young age, their quests were easily ones he drew upon himself to take up and pursue. In Laketown, it was no different. Thus for Legolas, Thorin's stubbornness aggrieved him, both for the people of Esgaroth and for his new friend, Bard. 

"He angers me so," Legolas said bitterly of Thorin one night as he stood with Bard on a low hill overlooking the encampments still being built for those who had survived. 

"He is of fiery temperament," the bowman replied quietly, for he withheld judgment. "And the riches around him serve him ill."

"He is no different than the dragon you slew," Legolas said sharply. "For thousands of years, these dwarves lived with treasures beyond imagining, hoarding, gloating. When this wealth was taken from them, one would have hoped for greater thoughtfulness about this hunger for riches. They are magpies thieving for the things that glitter."

The Bowman looked upon the elf, whose gossamer beauty could, if Bard were to close his eyes and imagine, shine as brightly as the greatest trove within the granite halls of Erebor. "You are an elf and so your measure of life and what fills it is far different than for men or dwarves," he said. "It is far too easy to covet riches when one's time is short."

Legolas looked to Bard in disagreement. "You are too kind by far. You allow him this excuse. Your life is a fragment of his in length, and yet you do not hunger so." 

"I hunger for other things," the bowman replied, but he spoke of something that was not his to hold, however briefly. 

The anger in the elf, however, clouded his understanding of the bowman's words. "Look upon how you fought to keep your people and your town safe. Look upon how you vanquished the dragon. No, the dwarf angers me beyond reason."

"Perhaps this is because you see his spirit being wasted for lack of forgiveness. Try to understand the roots of his claim. It is not for love of their riches so much as it is for love of their home." Yet even in his mind, Bard knew that the gold would become poison if it were not allowed to find many hands.

"Tell me this then. Why does he refuse your share? Not only might you be too kind, but you may be too naïve, good friend."

The Bowman was quiet for a time. "The lesson for us might be, Prince of Mirkwood, to consider the cost of exile upon the spirit. We look upon the mountain as a house of darkness, stagnant of air, lacking of life, filled with gold that buys power. But it was a kingdom and kin lost to him, a history torn away. It was a terrible wrong to his kind that needed to be set right. Were Mirkwood to be taken from your race…"

"Never!" said Legolas sharply, knowing too well the threat that had already diminished the Woodland Realm.

"But were it to _be_ ," the bowman persisted in a patient whisper, "what then the cost to your grace?"

The elf simmered in his silence, gazing upon the mountain that rose before them in the mist, considering the bowman's words. "Never," he whispered, the word spilling from his lips and from his youth.

"Then let us rest," Bard sighed at last. "My body aches everywhere and my mind desires nothing more than to sleep."

Legolas turned toward his new friend, his anger vanishing into the air. "It has been a victory hard won. It will be a sleep well earned."

"Aye," the bowman replied. "That it will be. You need not tarry with me."

"No, dragonslayer," Legolas replied with a gentle smile before turning once more towards the mountain. "I will stay while you sleep."

*

When the story of Thorin and his company had at last been told, the Elvenhost, led by their king, took up their departure, save for one.

It was trade that had taken Legolas to Esgaroth, and it was war and the friendship of a bowman that kept him there.


End file.
